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Whos of Whoville

The Whos live in Whoville on a speck of dust, and there were many types of Whos on many different specks, they wiggle and giggle, crawl, walk, swim and hop. They come in different shapes and sizes and each do different things, but what they all shared is that they do things that are necessary for other things to live. For they consumed the organic debris that settles around their homes and turn it into food so other things to survive. It is a system that for all living things works very well, a tree sheds it leaves, branches break, becomes food for the Whos of this earth and they in turn make the food to give back to the tree. The Whos are food for other creatures and then they in turn become the consumed. Starting with Whos and they may be very small, for even if we to look really close we can’t see them all, but they’re there and there are more of them under our feet, than there are of us as far as the eye can see. They are the basis of life, all living things depend on them, and they depend on other living things; the uniqueness of a location is to what it can support for life, depending on the soil, water and the environmental influences as to what invertebrate, fungi, bacteria will be present. It may seem too simplistic, maybe too Dr. Seuss, but it how the earth is and that is how all living things survive.

We are landscapers, work with the earth and create places for things to grow for the enjoyment of the people who live there, We have learned the beauty of plants and how to arrange them; so they look like belong together and we care for them; so hopefully they belong to the surrounding environment. We are also land stewards for we’re the ones who spend much of our time among the flora, working with the soil; we observe the changes that occur from the actions of ourselves and from others. We can see how changes to the landscape effects what can live there. We see the how one area effects another; rain and snow melt coming off the mountain settling in low areas creating wetlands that slows the high flow into the stream which runs into another stream to become a river, that makes it’s way to the ocean. Each of these systems is a unique ecosystem, but each totally interdependent with each other and what affects one does have effects on other ones.

So we can see when a forested area or farmland starts to change as it is developed, and the native vegetation and native soils removed and replaced by another type of ecosystem, one that typically more generic rather than it being unique and requires human management rather than its’ self management and how this effects the larger ecosystem. The changes that occur may not what is intended, and many times isn’t the clear cause and effect, rather it is each of the individual changes when they are added together that causes great changes to the larger natural ecosystem, that once changed is lost forever. We should help to try to find ways to minimize the impacts on the ecology of an area as we seek to develop it for our own use. To work with it, be part of it and to conserve it, for we are have knowledge and we have observed the impacts of change and we can help to educate others in proper ways to create spaces for people and still be part of that ecosystem; with our actions to help support it. Otherwise we lose the sense of place, when forest and fields become non-descript man made spaces, not connected to the greater environment surrounding it, and those changes effect the survival of the other living things that are dependent on that environment we do not know how in the long run it will affect us, but it will. From a human perspective, someday we won’t know where we are, for the uniqueness of a place will disappear and it will be replaced by the sameness of no place.

For all the Whos and all other living things; we might have to learn that this Earth isn’t something that we can use as we please, for the reality is all other living things would manage to survive and in most cases do better without us, whereas we won’t survive without them. For myself, I thank Dr. Seuss and to Horton for helping me to start to see what I can’t see and understand that this living Earth is the greater thing and we are part of it rather than above and we can learn from the Whos’